OUR VIEW: Sticking up for today's teens

We are as willing as anybody to step on the fingers of younger generations trying to climb the ladder of success behind us and to believe that — with their different tastes in dress, music and jargon — they represent a pause in evolutionary progress.

The Herald News, Fall River, MA

Writer

Posted May. 27, 2013 at 12:01 AM
Updated May 27, 2013 at 1:14 AM

Posted May. 27, 2013 at 12:01 AM
Updated May 27, 2013 at 1:14 AM

» Social News

We are as willing as anybody to step on the fingers of younger generations trying to climb the ladder of success behind us and to believe that — with their different tastes in dress, music and jargon — they represent a pause in evolutionary progress.

But sometimes one feels called on to defend the unfairly maligned.

Two psychology professors — Jean Twenge of San Diego State University and Tim Kasser of Knox College in Illinois — reviewed results from a national survey and write this month in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin that today’s young adults want nice things but are less willing than their predecessors to work hard for them.

And how does this make them different from most other Americans?

“Compared to previous generations,” Twenge writes, “recent high school graduates are more likely to want lots of money and nice things, but less likely to say they’re willing to work hard to earn them.”

Twenge, author of the book “Generation Me,” went on, “That type of ‘fantasy gap’ is consistent with other studies showing a generational increase in narcissism and entitlement.”

This would seem more of an economic than a social problem. Consumer spending accounts for 70 percent of U.S. economic activity, largely driven by materialism. If our young people think a new car, bigger TV and the latest in handheld devices are not worth the extra effort, we’re in economic trouble.

The sense of narcissism and entitlement sounds like standard adolescence. Real life will grind it out of youths in a process called maturity.

The survey was based on a nationally representative sample of 335,000 high school seniors and conducted from 1976 to 2007. Twenge and Kasser found that 62 percent of seniors surveyed in 2005-07 think it’s important to have a lot of money, while just 48 percent held the same belief in 1976-78.

Seniors in 2005-2007 were surveyed during the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression. Of course they thought it was important to have a lot of money; so did their parents.

The study said 69 percent of recent high school graduates thought it was important to own a home, compared to just 55 percent in 1976-’78. First off, we should thank the new graduates for showing a little faith in a housing market that’s been in upheaval almost ever since they’ve been in high school. Thanks to the crash, they can now afford a home in many places where they couldn’t before.

The thrust of this study is these youngsters are just like their elders in dealing with the U.S. government. They expect a lot of services and don’t want to pay very much for them. Seems like the latest crop of Americans is just like the last one.